Netbooks: Swivel Touchscreen Does Not Equal Tablet PC
A lot of people are very interested in the new netbooks that are getting touchscreen capability. The Asus T91 is attracting a lot of attention as a “Tablet PC” with netbook pricing. Since the convertible nature of the T91 means the screen can be swiveled around into a slate form, one could make the assumption that this device (or any other convertible) would be good for inking on the screen. I hear from people all the time wanting to know if these types of devices will be good for inking and I need to set the record straight. The correct answer to that question is: almost certainly not.
Slate Tablet PCs are great for writing on the screen — the form factor screams for that ability. Taking notes in a meeting or writing out emails is a natural use for these convertible devices, but the fact is that there are some things that prevent most devices from doing this well. Netbooks have passive digitizers that are built for touch input; operating the netbook with fingertips is pretty natural and especially effective for slate devices. The problem sets in when writing on the screen is desired.
Microsoft developed Windows XP Tablet Edition to power Tablet PCs with an active digitizer. These are the screens that require a special pen for writing on the digitizer screen with accuracy. The special digitizer is needed because touchscreen (passive or resistive) digitizers are less resolute than needed for good ink recognition on the screen. Touchscreens also react to any touch on the screen, so when you set your hand on the screen to write on it, the digitizer interprets the hand as it would the pen and produces what is called “vectoring.” Instead of nice ink appearing where you are writing, you get a bunch of scribbles produced from the simple act of setting the hand down on the screen. That’s why Tablet PCs of old used the special digitizers, which ignored touch completely.
Today, touchscreens have become common and folks like to drive their PC with the finger. These use the same passive digitizers built for touch and being used in convertible netbooks. Inking will not work on them for the reasons already noted. To produce a convertible netbook that works with touch and provides good inking requires special attention by the OEM. Those wanting a good inking experience are being confused by Microsoft’s incorporation of the Tablet Edition into premium versions of Vista, and now Windows 7. The expectation is that any convertible netbook running Windows 7 will be a good Tablet PC, and that is false. It requires special technology in addition to the OS to handle inking.
Dual digitizers can be used, one for touch and one for inking, but this is prohibitively expensive and not for the netbook crowd. Another method is to use a “hard” passive digitizer that ignores random touches by the hand on the screen. This is used by the expensive Fujitsu P1630 Tablet PC. It works well for inking but not so well for touch. The last method is to use a “soft” touchscreen that incorporates special “palm rejection” software. It can be manipulated easily by fingertip but is effective for inking as well. This software “sees” the hand when it rests on the screen but ignores it, expecting ink to be produced with a stylus.
This last method has been used successfully in the Intel Classmate convertible netbook we evaluated, which is only slightly more expensive than the average netbook. While the method worked very well and produced a good touch experience along with good inking, it required special software produced by Intel especially for the Classmate. While it demonstrates that other OEMs could duplicate this effort, it’s highly unlikely that they will do so, either from a lack of expertise or a desire to keep the netbook costs down. It’s unlikely any convertible netbooks are using this technique, which means they won’t do inking well at all.
Convertible netbooks are probably going to start appearing in greater numbers as they seem to be a hot item with those who follow the netbook space. Having a netbook that can work as a laptop and also as a handheld slate is pretty useful. They make for good web tablets operated by touch when in slate mode. Just remember that touch operation is generally as far as it goes. Don’t expect the ability to write notes on the screen or you’ll likely just be disappointed.
The only way you can semi write on the screen is to put your palm on the bezel of the tablet screen. I do this on the SC3 when I use it for taking notes. The Fujitsu U810 also had palm rejection which you could ink pretty well; even though the screen was pretty small. I would just use the sticky notes since the screen was small. I wouldn’t mind paying a little extra for better inking screen.
“Today, touch screens have become common and folks like to drive their PC with the finger.”
I agree with the gist of this post but I’m not sure either of those things are true. I’ve yet to see an HP Touchsmart or any other touch-enabled PC in the wild, nor have I ever seen a general user controlling a PC with their finger. It’s fun in theory but a mouse is simply better IMO.
Fujitsu’s P-Series tablets don’t just rely upon a hard touchscreen to prevent vectoring. They also use palm-recognition software to differentiate between palm and pen. However, like Derek I agree with the gist of your post
You are correct and I discussed that in numerous posts about the P1620 I used for so long. The hard touchscreen is what made the palm rejection work so well though, and some users have complained about both the inking and the touch control of those Tablets as a result.
Yes, that’s right. I’ve got a P1610 and rarely use my fingers on it because of the hard screen. You really need to use your fingernail to get anything to work which I generally found too awkward. The size of the P1610 was great but the touchscreen let it down IMO.
Because of that I upgraded to a 2730p (based mostly on your reviews of that and the 2710p). I’d like a true multitouch (as in finger + pen) tablet but prefer the ability to ink properly over the ability to touch. Of course, that might change when Windows 7 comes out
Hi, i have a Q1UP-V (with W7) and I have become quite an enthusiastic inker, but I have been missing some keyboard (dont mind if it is the eee 901 keyboard for example). Do you think is a good idea to change to the T91? specially if I like inking (onenote on a daily basis)? are the touchscreen technologies that different between them?
Thanks in advance and greetings from Chile.
Upcoming Eee PC T91 will have multitouch on the Windows 7 version: http://jkkmobile.blogspot.com/2009/06/asus-eee-pc-t91-with-multitouch-screen.html
That might help on hand writing too…
Do they make a 10″ active screen?
I’ve been using my first tablet pc (which has a dual digitizer) for about two years now. I would say that I used the touch screen everyday, about 10 times or so. Mostly to flip through pdfs or to click on buttons.
The active digitizer is very smooth, but I rarely use it. It may be that I’m too used to writing with a keyboard, but I just don’t like using the Input Panel.
I would say, if you just want to do the basic stuff, go with a passive digitizer. I will cost less and offers much of the same functionality. Just don’t expect your handwriting to look all that great.
I’m not a big fan of the input panel either. I always envisioned directly inking into textboxes and stuff, and the software would automagically make things good.
It’s very frustrating, to be sure, to ink on a normal touch screen. Unfortunately, for me, it’s the only game in town. When inking on my SC3 (7″ screen) the only way, as HG said, is to put your palm on the bezel. Makes for very untidy inking though. The other thing I do is to use a proper stylus than the tiny stick it comes with. It gives you a bit more reach and comfort.
As for using your fingers to operate Windows – well, I’ve found it extremely frustrating and always end up using a stylus.
I’m not totally convinced about your point. Although active digitizers are better, passive digitizers are good for digitizing and vectoring. My proof: My Palm T/X, that can recognize digitizing of the letters I write into it. If a little Palm can do that, why a 9 inch screen can’t without fancy hardware?
Lower resolution digitizer makes sophisticated handwriting recognition much more difficult. Not to mention the fact that it is impossible to write on a 9-inch screen without resting your palm on the digitizer, which is recognized as a stylus touch.
I’ve yearned for a Wacom-or-N-Trig-equipped tablet netbook for 500 US$ or less NEW, so that the average person (read: not the likes of us, who know about buying used HP TC1100s and the like) will see it on a store shelf, know it exists, and at least consider buying it.
That said, resistive digitizers work okay on small-screened (4″ 4:3/4.3″ 16:9 or less) devices because you’re not very likely to touch the screen with your palm, but getting beyond that, there will be problems if a resistive digitizer is used for the pen/stylus. (While I’ve never used one of the old Apple Newton MessagePad 2000/2100s, I’m still not sure about their 6″ resistive-only screens. They seem just large enough that I could accidentally touch the screen with my writing hand.)
My priorities are on the pen/stylus, however. While I would like to just touch my TC1100’s screen sometimes, I get over it because I don’t want to deal with the accidental input issues that could result if it did have the capability to register finger touch. Also, pressure sensitivity is an EXPECTATION from me-something you can only get out of a Wacom or N-Trig pen (especially the former).
I have both active digitizer on Siemens T4215 and passive digitizer on Asus T91. The differences are huge. Just forget it if you really want to ink with T91, while T4215 is too heavy to carry around (> 2 kg when two batteries are used), although it inks well. I just heard Asus is going to launch eee pc T101, a successor to T91. Is it possible to have the ability to reject palm touch? Anybody knows?